Sunday, February 27, 2011
Wednesday, February 23, 2011
Soi 11 Special
Sukhumvit Soi 11 is a "one stop shop" when it comes to night time entertainment. It is chock full of restaurants, bars and clubs to suit anyone's tastes. The list is astounding:
Mrs Balbir's, Zanzibar, Cheap Charlie's, Charlie Browns, Tapas, The Pickled Liver, Suk 11, Climax, The Old German Beer House, Contrazi, Pizzeria Limoncello, The Australian Pub, Temples Bar, The Manchester United Bar, The Nest, Bed Supper Club, QBar and more.
I went on a little photo expedition late last night to capture this visually delicious soi.
Mrs Balbir's, Zanzibar, Cheap Charlie's, Charlie Browns, Tapas, The Pickled Liver, Suk 11, Climax, The Old German Beer House, Contrazi, Pizzeria Limoncello, The Australian Pub, Temples Bar, The Manchester United Bar, The Nest, Bed Supper Club, QBar and more.
I went on a little photo expedition late last night to capture this visually delicious soi.
Sunday, February 20, 2011
Saturday, February 19, 2011
Love Hate Strange Beautiful - Survey
I asked four questions on Facebook - a wonderful medium through which one can get all sorts of answers and opinions :o) - about Bangkok, and these are the answers I received. All the answers came from expats living in Bangkok. I have copied and pasted them, pretty much, just how I received them (with the exception of a few spelling corrections ;o). The opinions expressed below do not necessarily reflect my own:
Question 1: What do you love most about living in Bangkok?
Answers (in no particular order):
1. Beautiful women at every turn.
2. The freedom - a non nanny state.
3. Freedom - In that I can safely walk around without getting shot at or robbed. I also like the fact that there are so many places to enjoy great food, shopping and movies.
4. The fact that I feel safe, good street food, the things that can be reached from such a central location and major city.
5. Its vibrancy, daily - colour, activities, people, bustle.
6. Having a full time maid.
7. The people and their sense of making things happen.
8. My Job/Jobs and the low cost of all transportation
9. Bangkok has allowed me to choose the kind of life I want to live at any particular time. I dictate my life here, it doesn't dictate me.
Question 2: What do you hate most about living in Bangkok?
Answers:
1. Moronic driving skills.
2. The traffic
3. The double prices between Thai's and Foreigners. Haggling gets old quickly. And the traffic.
4. The lack of genuine imagination and creativity, originality seems to be a non existent word here. the poverty bothers me and the very hierarchical nature that it brings with it. The seedier sides of the country's sex tourism. The fact that although cheap, its nowhere near as cheap as people seem to think.
5. Its piercing, inescapable noise.
6. Difficult communication wherever you go
7. Mosquitoes
8. Slow Walkers!!!
9. Crazy chicks and lazy men.
Question 3: What is the strangest thing you have ever seen in Bangkok?
Answers:
1. The ladyboy who does the girls makeup in the Pink Panther, Patpong - just got to be seen!
2. Used to be elephants, now the total disregard for childrens safety, mum and dad wear a helmet, but the three kids hanging on to the motorbike are not.
3. Besides those odd squatting toilets, the amount of ladyboys and often depressed looking foreigners, I'd have to say some of the driving laws (or lack thereof).
4. Riding a scooter at 65 mph, eating pork balls and texting. people complaining about their skin while eating processed "meat" balls and deep fried chicken. obsession with a single strand of hair in the mirror. the amount of whitening product in everything. people who spend more money on their car than their house.
5. A 'herd' of prostitutes in high heels being chased across Phetburi road by police. (seriously!)
6. Kids selling flowers in the red zone of Bangkok at 4am.
7. A body floating in the Chao Praya River.
8. A klong (canal) alligator outside my condo.
9. A torrential downpour on the other side of the road but no rain on the side I was on.
Question 4: What is the most beautiful thing you have ever seen in Bangkok?
Answers:
1. A Pair of twins who live in On Nut.
2. Sunsets - smog makes a good sunset.
3. The desire for people to help each other in the event of an accident, elderly crossing the road or even a natural disaster.
4. The sun on the high rise buildings during sunset and sunrise. Lumpini on the days where the sun shines with the golden colour rather than being bright (probably due to smog). The heavier thunder storms. The two girls caught in the rain down by siam square. The small group of palm trees on the vacant lot on 31. Some of the vacant buildings. Happy people despite their circumstances.
5. Old Thai houses with beautiful gardens buried amongst developed areas - there are so many, but principle is the same, history and traditions with rich green gardens amongst the metropolis.
6. The view and sunset over BKK from Vertigo Bar and thunderstorms at night.
7. The hidden architecture amongst the sprawl.
8. The entire city, stepping outside together, holding candles in silence on the night of the King's Birthday
9. The sky - especially sunsets during the rainy season.
Question 1: What do you love most about living in Bangkok?
Answers (in no particular order):
1. Beautiful women at every turn.
2. The freedom - a non nanny state.
3. Freedom - In that I can safely walk around without getting shot at or robbed. I also like the fact that there are so many places to enjoy great food, shopping and movies.
4. The fact that I feel safe, good street food, the things that can be reached from such a central location and major city.
5. Its vibrancy, daily - colour, activities, people, bustle.
6. Having a full time maid.
7. The people and their sense of making things happen.
8. My Job/Jobs and the low cost of all transportation
9. Bangkok has allowed me to choose the kind of life I want to live at any particular time. I dictate my life here, it doesn't dictate me.
Question 2: What do you hate most about living in Bangkok?
Answers:
1. Moronic driving skills.
2. The traffic
3. The double prices between Thai's and Foreigners. Haggling gets old quickly. And the traffic.
4. The lack of genuine imagination and creativity, originality seems to be a non existent word here. the poverty bothers me and the very hierarchical nature that it brings with it. The seedier sides of the country's sex tourism. The fact that although cheap, its nowhere near as cheap as people seem to think.
5. Its piercing, inescapable noise.
6. Difficult communication wherever you go
7. Mosquitoes
8. Slow Walkers!!!
9. Crazy chicks and lazy men.
Question 3: What is the strangest thing you have ever seen in Bangkok?
Answers:
1. The ladyboy who does the girls makeup in the Pink Panther, Patpong - just got to be seen!
2. Used to be elephants, now the total disregard for childrens safety, mum and dad wear a helmet, but the three kids hanging on to the motorbike are not.
3. Besides those odd squatting toilets, the amount of ladyboys and often depressed looking foreigners, I'd have to say some of the driving laws (or lack thereof).
4. Riding a scooter at 65 mph, eating pork balls and texting. people complaining about their skin while eating processed "meat" balls and deep fried chicken. obsession with a single strand of hair in the mirror. the amount of whitening product in everything. people who spend more money on their car than their house.
5. A 'herd' of prostitutes in high heels being chased across Phetburi road by police. (seriously!)
6. Kids selling flowers in the red zone of Bangkok at 4am.
7. A body floating in the Chao Praya River.
8. A klong (canal) alligator outside my condo.
9. A torrential downpour on the other side of the road but no rain on the side I was on.
Question 4: What is the most beautiful thing you have ever seen in Bangkok?
Answers:
1. A Pair of twins who live in On Nut.
2. Sunsets - smog makes a good sunset.
3. The desire for people to help each other in the event of an accident, elderly crossing the road or even a natural disaster.
4. The sun on the high rise buildings during sunset and sunrise. Lumpini on the days where the sun shines with the golden colour rather than being bright (probably due to smog). The heavier thunder storms. The two girls caught in the rain down by siam square. The small group of palm trees on the vacant lot on 31. Some of the vacant buildings. Happy people despite their circumstances.
5. Old Thai houses with beautiful gardens buried amongst developed areas - there are so many, but principle is the same, history and traditions with rich green gardens amongst the metropolis.
6. The view and sunset over BKK from Vertigo Bar and thunderstorms at night.
7. The hidden architecture amongst the sprawl.
8. The entire city, stepping outside together, holding candles in silence on the night of the King's Birthday
9. The sky - especially sunsets during the rainy season.
Thursday, February 17, 2011
Bangkok Beautiful
Bangkok. Everybody has their opinions about this fine city. One's opinion is usually subject to one's experience and one's experience is vastly varied depending on a plethora of factors. Your sex, your age, the length of time you have lived here, the people you converse with, the area in which you live, the places you spend your leisure time, what you do for a living, how much money you earn, the reasons you came to Thailand in the first place, et cetera.
We all know that the reasons are not always honourable and that, alone, will dictate your daily life here. But honourable or not, if you're an expat living in Bangkok, you have more than likely chosen to be here. If you have chosen to be here, you have decided at some point that you like it here. Well, that's the theory anyway. However, we all know that there are plenty of residents of Bangkok who can't say a single decent thing about the city they've chosen to live in (or flee to - which ever), and that is irrefutably sad.
Bangkok is beautiful. It is exceptionally easy to focus on the negative, its not exactly discreet in this city. It is also easy to complain, and it's annoying all the same.
If you open your eyes, you will see that the sun shines on this city. It is there everyday, and when it isn't, it doesn't go for long. At nightfall, there can be magic in the air...if you actually go outside or your senses haven't been utterly destroyed by the stench of stale sex, or drugs, or misdirected spite.
Bangkok is beautiful for a million different reasons. It is beautiful because there is a corner on Sukhumvit Soi 39 that is drenched in the scent of Eucalyptus on cool breezy nights; because despite what some may think, there is a very distinct change in seasons; because there was a time in my early twenties when I managed to survive off a couple of hundred Baht a week; because every time you step outside, you are bound to see something no one will believe; because the cops that clear you at a drug checkpoint will warn you about the alcohol checkpoint; because I have seen it pour with rain on one side of the road and not the other; because the possibilities are endless....
xoxo
We all know that the reasons are not always honourable and that, alone, will dictate your daily life here. But honourable or not, if you're an expat living in Bangkok, you have more than likely chosen to be here. If you have chosen to be here, you have decided at some point that you like it here. Well, that's the theory anyway. However, we all know that there are plenty of residents of Bangkok who can't say a single decent thing about the city they've chosen to live in (or flee to - which ever), and that is irrefutably sad.
Bangkok is beautiful. It is exceptionally easy to focus on the negative, its not exactly discreet in this city. It is also easy to complain, and it's annoying all the same.
If you open your eyes, you will see that the sun shines on this city. It is there everyday, and when it isn't, it doesn't go for long. At nightfall, there can be magic in the air...if you actually go outside or your senses haven't been utterly destroyed by the stench of stale sex, or drugs, or misdirected spite.
Bangkok is beautiful for a million different reasons. It is beautiful because there is a corner on Sukhumvit Soi 39 that is drenched in the scent of Eucalyptus on cool breezy nights; because despite what some may think, there is a very distinct change in seasons; because there was a time in my early twenties when I managed to survive off a couple of hundred Baht a week; because every time you step outside, you are bound to see something no one will believe; because the cops that clear you at a drug checkpoint will warn you about the alcohol checkpoint; because I have seen it pour with rain on one side of the road and not the other; because the possibilities are endless....
xoxo
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)